Wednesday Bible Study: Picking through Judges part 7

 

I'm going to surprise you by not digging into the five minor judges surrounding Jephthah just yet.  Because there is a hard nugget to understand in Jephthah, and in praying about it, I was moved that the story was the mirror reflection of the story we just finished with Abimelech.  Seen that way, it quickly becomes a "right way- wrong way" parable within the story, and I think that this- even including that 'hard nugget', is the way God wants us to see it in this context.  I'm going to try to tell the tale with chronology draped over this structure, so bear with.

First of all, if you think back, Abimelech's was the first story that didn't start out with, "And the people of Israel did evil..."  mainly because he BECAME the evil.  Not so with Jephthah:

Jdg 10:6  The people of Israel again did what was evil in the sight of the LORD and served the Baals and the Ashtaroth, the gods of Syria, the gods of Sidon, the gods of Moab, the gods of the Ammonites, and the gods of the Philistines. And they forsook the LORD and did not serve him. 

Moreover, in the first story, I had to point out how, unlike the others, God chose not to intervene directly, because they weren't listening anyway.  Not so, here...

Jdg 10:10  And the people of Israel cried out to the LORD, saying, "We have sinned against you, because we have forsaken our God and have served the Baals."
Jdg 10:11  And the LORD said to the people of Israel, "Did I not save you from the Egyptians and from the Amorites, from the Ammonites and from the Philistines?
Jdg 10:12  The Sidonians also, and the Amalekites and the Maonites oppressed you, and you cried out to me, and I saved you out of their hand.
Jdg 10:13  Yet you have forsaken me and served other gods; therefore I will save you no more. 

Jdg 10:14  Go and cry out to the gods whom you have chosen; let them save you in the time of your distress." 

Jdg 10:15  And the people of Israel said to the LORD, "We have sinned; do to us whatever seems good to you. Only please deliver us this day."

Recognition, at last, of their sin- and in the following verse, the setting aside of their idols- did the trick; the Lord relented.  Now here you're going to get the only treatment I'm going to give the five minor judges.  I'll point out something about one, and reference three others....

Jdg 10:3  After him arose Jair the Gileadite, who judged Israel twenty-two years.
Jdg 10:4  And he had thirty sons who rode on thirty donkeys, and they had thirty cities, called Havvoth-jair to this day, which are in the land of Gilead... 

Jdg 12:8  After him Ibzan of Bethlehem judged Israel.
Jdg 12:9  He had thirty sons, and thirty daughters he gave in marriage outside his clan, and thirty daughters he brought in from outside for his sons. And he judged Israel seven years.

Jdg 12:13  After him Abdon the son of Hillel the Pirathonite judged Israel.
Jdg 12:14  He had forty sons and thirty grandsons, who rode on seventy donkeys, and he judged Israel eight years.

Throw in with this Tola, who had no donkeys, but whose name references a worm used to make expensive crimson cloth, and these are all relatively rich men for the time- and while they served the Lord well, they did not achieve the glory that a poor boy like Gideon- or as we shall see, Jephthah- did.  Nor does Abimelech, the spoiled son of a de facto king.  God can and does work through the rich- but does his greatest work with the most unlikely.

And just what makes Jephthah unlikely?

Jdg 11:1  Now Jephthah the Gileadite was a mighty warrior, but he was the son of a prostitute. Gilead was the father of Jephthah.

Just like Abimelech, the son of a not-full wife, Jephthah was a harlot's son.  But while hate-filled Abimelech killed his brothers, Jephthah, in a way, had this reversed....

Jdg 11:2  And Gilead's wife also bore him sons. And when his wife's sons grew up, they drove Jephthah out and said to him, "You shall not have an inheritance in our father's house, for you are the son of another woman."
Jdg 11:3  Then Jephthah fled from his brothers and lived in the land of Tob, and worthless fellows collected around Jephthah and went out with him.

Now, here's the next contrast:  while Abimelech had to PAY men to follow him, men naturally were drawn to Jephthah.  There was something different about Jephthah, which we'll see soon enough.  The next contrast fell hot on the heels of this one.  Because, as we mentioned, the Lord was allowing all of Israel's neighbors to attack- not just in the north like Sisera, or just passing through like Cushaim the Double-Wicked, or the weaker neighbors like Moab, but all of the above- and they were making inroads into heretofore untouched Judah.  And unlike Abimelech, who had to politick the men of Shechem, the Men of Gilead came to Jephthah:

Jdg 11:5  And when the Ammonites made war against Israel, the elders of Gilead went to bring Jephthah from the land of Tob.
Jdg 11:6  And they said to Jephthah, "Come and be our leader, that we may fight against the Ammonites."
Jdg 11:7  But Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, "Did you not hate me and drive me out of my father's house? Why have you come to me now when you are in distress?"
Jdg 11:8  And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, "That is why we have turned to you now, that you may go with us and fight against the Ammonites and be our head over all the inhabitants of Gilead."
Jdg 11:9  Jephthah said to the elders of Gilead, "If you bring me home again to fight against the Ammonites, and the LORD gives them over to me, I will be your head."
Jdg 11:10  And the elders of Gilead said to Jephthah, "The LORD will be witness between us, if we do not do as you say."

And indeed, the Lord was made witness, as we see next:

Jdg 11:11  So Jephthah went with the elders of Gilead, and the people made him head and leader over them. And Jephthah spoke all his words before the LORD at Mizpah.

And here, perhaps, is the biggest, or at least most important, contrast:  Jephthah went before the Lord, unlike Abimelech, who accepted money from Baal-Berith.  This is why Jephthah was blessed, and got his name in the "Faith Hall Of Fame" in Hebrews 11.  One chooses evil, one accepts his lot.  One is violent, one accepts persecution.  One makes himself a 'king', one makes himself a servant.  But it goes on.

The commonality of their birth was one of two things that I saw the two had in common. The other was this- they had enemies that didn't listen.  You remember Gaal last week, too hung over to realize his doom before it struck; in this story, Jephthah send to his enemies, asking why they attacked.  Here you have to go back to the book of Numbers...

Num 21:24  And Israel defeated him (Sihon of the Amorites) with the edge of the sword and took possession of his land from the Arnon to the Jabbok, as far as to the Ammonites, for the border of the Ammonites was strong.
Num 21:25  And Israel took all these cities, and Israel settled in all the cities of the Amorites, in Heshbon, and in all its villages.
Num 21:26  For Heshbon was the city of Sihon the king of the Amorites, who had fought against the former king of Moab and taken all his land out of his hand, as far as the Arnon.
Num 21:27  Therefore the ballad singers say, "Come to Heshbon, let it be built; let the city of Sihon be established.
Num 21:28  For fire came out from Heshbon, flame from the city of Sihon. It devoured Ar of Moab, and swallowed the heights of the Arnon.
Num 21:29  Woe to you, O Moab! You are undone, O people of Chemosh! He has made his sons fugitives, and his daughters captives, to an Amorite king, Sihon.
Num 21:30  So we overthrew them; Heshbon, as far as Dibon, perished; and we laid waste as far as Nophah; fire spread as far as Medeba."


The key so far as our story is verse 29:  Moab had first lived in Hesbon, the brothers (remember Lot?) of the Ammonites, and serving the same god, Chemosh.  They were driven out by Sihon's Amorites, who were then conquered by Israel.  But when Jephthah asked the Ammonites their reason for war, they claimed that it was Israel, not Sihon, who stole this land from them.  And it was because of this lie Jephthah answered them:

Jdg 11:23 ... So then the LORD, the God of Israel, dispossessed the Amorites from before his people Israel; and are you to take possession of them?
Jdg 11:24  Will you not possess what Chemosh your god gives you to possess? And all that the LORD our God has dispossessed before us, we will possess.
Jdg 11:25  Now are you any better than Balak the son of Zippor, king of Moab? Did he ever contend against Israel, or did he ever go to war with them? 

Jdg 11:26  While Israel lived in Heshbon and its villages, and in Aroer and its villages, and in all the cities that are on the banks of the Arnon, 300 years, why did you not deliver them within that time? 

Jdg 11:27  I therefore have not sinned against you, and you do me wrong by making war on me. The LORD, the Judge, decide this day between the people of Israel and the people of Ammon." 

Abimelech justified himself by what he could win with his sword-arm.  Jephthah justified his stand with the truth.  But, like I said...

Jdg 11:28  But the king of the Ammonites did not listen to the words of Jephthah that he sent to him.

 

And thus it was that Jephthah and his army defeated Ammon and drove them from Israel.  But then, a very familiar twist occurs...

Jdg 12:1  The men of Ephraim were called to arms, and they crossed to Zaphon and said to Jephthah, "Why did you cross over to fight against the Ammonites and did not call us to go with you? We will burn your house over you with fire."

Once again, self-important Ephraim, who had every opportunity to save Israel and sat back while others did, comes out afterwards to claim a little of the glory.  Here is a lesson about self-importance- it deludes your thinking.  If you were scared to fight the Ammonites, who Jephthah beat (or earlier, the Midianites, who Gideon beat), how is it you have the courage to come against your own kinsmen?  Unlike Gideon, who mollycoddled them with words, Jephthah used words to teach them a lesson:

Jdg 12:5  And the Gileadites captured the fords of the Jordan against the Ephraimites. And when any of the fugitives of Ephraim said, "Let me go over," the men of Gilead said to him, "Are you an Ephraimite?" When he said, "No,"
Jdg 12:6  they said to him, "Then say Shibboleth," and he said, "Sibboleth," for he could not pronounce it right. Then they seized him and slaughtered him at the fords of the Jordan. At that time 42,000 of the Ephraimites fell.

And that would be "they all lived happily ever after", but for that hard nugget I mentioned before.  And thew only way to explain it God's way is in the contrast.  Remember in the tale of Abimelech, Jotham the surviving brother, levied a curse on him that came true to Abimelech's destruction?  Well, this happened here:

Jdg 11:30  And Jephthah made a vow to the LORD and said, "If you will give the Ammonites into my hand,
Jdg 11:31  then whatever comes out from the doors of my house to meet me when I return in peace from the Ammonites shall be the LORD's, and I will offer it up for a burnt offering."

And then...

Jdg 11:34  Then Jephthah came to his home at Mizpah. And behold, his daughter came out to meet him with tambourines and with dances. She was his only child; besides her he had neither son nor daughter.
Jdg 11:35  And as soon as he saw her, he tore his clothes and said, "Alas, my daughter! You have brought me very low, and you have become the cause of great trouble to me. For I have opened my mouth to the LORD, and I cannot take back my vow."

Now, if you read the Jewish accounts, they claim, 'Jephthah would have known he could have had the vow annulled by the priest, but he was too proud to bow before a priest he considered beneath him.  Indeed, the two months his daughter requested...

Jdg 11:37  So she said to her father, "Let this thing be done for me: leave me alone two months, that I may go up and down on the mountains and weep for my virginity, I and my companions."

..was her going to the priest and appealing the decision, to which the priest refused unless Jephthah himself came.  So he sacrificed her, and he died a cursed, horrible death for his sin.'

Yes, that's the story the Rabbis came up with.  Because it glorified them, as they were of the priesthood.  The truth, taught by the Bible, was simpler.  Jephthah fulfilled his vows to the Lord, even to his hurt.  And, his death?

Jdg 12:7  Jephthah judged Israel six years. Then Jephthah the Gileadite died and was buried in his city in Gilead.

In this story, God is not glorifying human sacrifice.  It is obvious that Jephthah's vow was a foolish one.  What God does show us admirable are Jephthah's obediences:

He set the whole deal to God's will.

He put the truth before lies, before rage, before avarice.

He did not stand for falsehood from friend or foe.

And he kept his promises, even to his own hurt.

That, I think, accomplished not by a rich man but a poor one, is God's lesson for us in his story.  And that's why he made the Faith Hall Of Fame.